The world shouldn't work that way either: if companies stopped providing the goods and services people needed because a few self-appointed guardians of the public good scream about it on social media, we'd never have been able to make progress at all, since these activists have no special power to distinguish change from regression, and so err toward stasis.
If you want high-engagement features disabled, fine. Propose a law. Let's duke it out in the process of government. You will lose, badly, because your position is wildly unpopular with the vast body of the population.
OK. That may be true. but demand is also a poor signal of distinguishing progress from regression.
So let's work on that. On a better method for doing so. It seems possible to do so, using the knowledge we gained in the many sciences dealing with human/eco welfare.
>> Let's duke it out in the process of government. ... You will lose, badly, because your position is wildly unpopular with the vast body of the population.
Leaving aside the many failures of democracy, people not always know or prefer the thing that is good for them in the long term. I'm not saying that totalitarinsm is OK, but most people do benefit from living in an environment that guides them well, surrounds them with good things, and makes it hard for them to choose the wrong choices.
And "knowledge"? What knowledge? The social sciences largely do not reproduce. For the past few decades, the social sciences have been a mystic cult with political aspirations. We knew more in 1990 than we "know" now.
In the grand parent post, we talked about "YT and FB could fix these social issues overnight, if they wanted to: turn off autoplay, turn off recommendations, restore chronological timelines, and dial down the ads.". It is quite different from the great evils of history.
And sure, we should work on reproducing social sciences. it's a big problem.
But i would guess that if you'd describe something like the internet that is today in very general terms(possible to predict once you know that attention/engagement is the lead driver) to psychologists, a decade ago, they would have told you that it may hold some serious potential problems.
Does it mean we need to stop progress ? maybe not, but slowing "progress" in the name of caution may not be a bad trade-off. and once we see the dangers, rolling it back(even against the addicted population's wishes) may also be a decent option.
So mild totalitarianism is be okay?
No, there is no acceptable "middle ground" in which a bunch of Twitter gets in the way of consenting business and consumers and tells people how to run their lives.
The idea of a republic is not that different. Acoording to its tenets, the masses are still not to be trusted to make the decisions because they dont know whats good for them. Instead, they are supposed to choose a small fraction of people who not only are supposed to know whats good for them but would also make decisions that is good for them.
It is not a whole lot less patronizing than 'masses don't know what's good for them'
The world absolutely _should_ work that way. Companies _should_ have half a brain to realise that selling bottled water is bad for the environment, that fracking causes earthquakes, that sugar is the root of all dietary evil, that tobacco is carcinogenic, that overfishing causes unspeakable damage to ocean life, that SUVs are colossal wastes of space and fuel...
All the companies doing the above are providing wildly popular goods and services. And a lot of them are perfectly legal too.
Your suggestion implies that all this is just dandy, thank you very much, so take your hemp clothing and your vegan sandals and your do-gooderness off of my property and gtfo acting as a "self appointed guardian".
What kind of extreme libertarian hard-on does a man have to possess to believe that all of this is how society SHOULD work?
I deeply resent this sentiment that you have to take the good with the bad of a free market society because there is no alternative. Of course there is! Regulate these idiots into the ground! While this is clearly a pipe dream, that's a long way away from the statement that this is how society _should_ be.
That firms are able to dismantle, oppose, co-opt, or avoid such frameworks is very much part of the problem.
I'd like to see vast changes in liability and increased veil-piercing abilities.
For those who are vocabulary stunted (like me apparently):
myopic: nearsighted.
vitriol: cruel and bitter criticism.
And it's funny that you're challenging people to fight Facebook & co in the process of government, which has been subverted by lobbyist money from... Facebook & co. Why do you think that the US government is asleep at the wheel when it comes to privacy? Because they're paid a lot of money to not worry about it. And with enough money changing hands, it becomes easy to think that in fact those services are needed by the public and they represent progress.
So no thanks. The self-appointed guardians of the public are smart to use different tactics.
Citation needed.
If the future is passive consumption of propaganda and marketing content masquerading as "entertainment", you can count me out. I'll go chop wood and raise chickens while I watch for the system to collapse under its own weight.
Idiocracy portrais that kind of future very well.
It's immensely useful to me and just because you don't like it doesn't make it some evil plot to control our minds. Remember that TV has had autoplay since its inception. It's just a natural way to consume media passively.
Yes, "bad" (who is to judge?) defaults might be slightly immoral, but they are at least giving users the option to not use them.
The deeper philosophical question seems to be whether it's more desirable for people to have the skills to control their own education or whether it's more desirable to optimize tools for bringing educational resources to people. You can go a bit deeper than that and ask whether it's more desirable to have a population of independent thinkers or like-minded thinkers. We'd probably be better off with a bit of both.
I prefer to frame these kinds of arguments in terms of educational materials, which you can kinda loosely call most forms of media.
I suspect it wouldn't even cost them all that much but no amount of discomfort of the users can balance out a few bucks of extra income.
the price is $0.
How do you feel about HN's implementation of the same feature (noprocrast)? https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=tomc1985
It’s annoying at least.
YouTube actually has a treasure trove of content and once you find it, you get more of it[1]. And their recommendations are really handy to see related content.
No ads with YouTube Red.
[1] e.g., I mostly see stuff from channels like CGP Grey, Kurzgesagt, Veritasium, Vsauce, Every Frame a Painting, Vox, Jordan Peterson, Matthias Wandel, Nerdwriter1, AvE, TED Talks, SciShow, Engineer Guy, LastWeekTonight, SmarterEveryDay, etc...
What social issues? I remember old conservatives railing about gansta rap and south park causing social issues back i the day. Now it's old people whining about YT and FB. They aren't cause of social issues and they aren't the solution either. No more than smartphones or flat screen TVs.
> if they wanted to: turn off autoplay, turn off recommendations,
Why should they?
> But they won't because that is the core of their business model.
Sure. But what about the people who want recommendations or autoplay?
What's with select group of people on HN and their totalitarian mindset? Just because you don't have impulse control doesn't mean others don't have it.
I like recommendations because it helps me find relevant videos. For example, if I search for C# or Haskell tutorials, it's great to see other C# or haskell videos. Same thing for recipes or how-to videos or nature videos or anything else. Why should I and others be denied something because you don't like it?
It's crazy that some of the people on "hacker" news are so dedicated on censorship. Somehow hacker news turned from a very programmer/tech/free speech forum to old people whining about their lives and society.
How about personal responsibility? How about not blaming others for your own short coming?
> Instead they offer bullshit mind-repair services to fix the damage they continue to do.
I agree, they shouldn't give in. Instead they should tell advertisers and people who whine to simply stop using youtube.
I don't understand why youtube and the rest of social media/tech industry simply put their foot down and say enough is enough.
What about hacker news? Do you think hacker news should be shut down? Is hacker news responsible for social issues?
Gangsta rap and South Park are content. This thread is about platforms and how the medium can shape the message. The analogy does not hold water.
The rest of your comment is kinda off-topic and ranty, but that wasn't a great way to start it. Friendly advice.
By day, YouTube and Facebook sell us glass repair services, at a special price no less!
YT and FB could fix these social issues overnight, if they wanted to: turn off autoplay, turn off recommendations, restore chronological timelines, and dial down the ads. But they won't because that is the core of their business model.
Instead they offer bullshit mind-repair services to fix the damage they continue to do.